How Smart Real Estate Professionals are Using Social Media to Help, Not Sell

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with New York Times Best Selling Author Jay Baer and discuss how real estate professionals can embrace the concept of helping, not selling.

Jay is a renowned marketing strategist and the author of YouTility and his latest book, “YouTility for Real Estate: How Smart Real Estate Professionals are Helping, Not Selling.”

Smart real estate professionals are applying the concepts of Youtility, giving away information and resources for free, to differentiate and dominate by providing real value to clients and prospective clients.

What You’ll Learn:

– How to create differentiation in your local marketplace
– The shift from selling to helping and how it can transform your business
– What the power of “friend of mind awareness” can do for your business
– How to be useful, transparent and relevant to your target market

Read a few of the highlights below and then watch the full interview.

How Real Estate Professionals are Using Social Media

Rebekah: Can you explain Youtility and what it means to a real estate professional?

Jay: The principle of Youtility and one of the main tenets of Youtility is self-serve information. It’s letting people have access to information without having to contact you or have a meeting with you or telephone call with you or Hangout with you. That kind of self-serve information can be really challenging because you’re like,

“Hey, I spent all this time, either in school or in business to learn these things, and now you’re saying give that all away?”

But here’s the thing and how Youtility works – you give away knowledge snacks to sell information meals. So, you’re giving away little bits of what you know, a taste at a time as an hors d’oeuvre and you use those hors d’oeuvres to get people to,

A. Trust you

B. Believe in you

And after that happens, then they want to actually have a relationship with you but that takes some time and it takes some measure of courage to actually give away what you know, even a little bit at a time.

Rebekah: One of the biggest misconceptions I see, no matter what umbrella you’re under, is that a real estate professional is still a personal brand. I loved your examples of my friends Raj Qsar and Anne Jones and how they’re standing out online.

Jay: Raj is from The Boutique Real Estate Group and their use of high-end real estate video is incredible. It doesn’t just say, “Hey, here, look, they have a fence. Look! A pool.” It actually tells a story.

It’s almost like a mini documentary film that not only gives you what might be classified as a video brochure, but this tells an emotional story.

In some cases, there are actually actors in their real estate movies. It ties back to sort of an emotional level and this will probably be a corny way to say this is, but they create videos that make a house feel like a home.

Anne Jones, a real estate professional in Tacoma, is in a completely different market and uses video in a very different way. Anne gives you a behind the scenes look into her business and shares how cost effective using video to showcase a home can truly can be.

Anne hires a professional to do those video tours, but she also uses Google Hangouts to just sit down and talk about what she does. She has a willingness to give information away — “Here’s exactly how I do this and here’s the budget and I’m not holding anything back.”

I think that is particularly admirable because the real estate industry has historically tended to say, “This is my secret. I’m not going to share my secret with you.”

My Takeaways

I was incredibly honored to sit down with Jay and loved discussing how so many real estate professionals are crushing it within their local market. However, my key takeaway was this.

No matter your industry, you always have a chance to shape and mold perception. You have the opportunity to change how information is shared and how potential clients find and interact with you. Just because your competition pushes out content or promotes the hard sell — all off the time — doesn’t mean you have to.

Ask yourself every day, how can I help, not sell to my potential customer and how can I be a benefit that will make them naturally want to connect, engage and interact?

As Jay says, “the difference between helping and selling is just two letters. But those letters make all the difference. Your company needs to become a YOUtility. Sell something, and you make a customer. Help someone, and you make a customer for life.”

Hi, What a nice and well-written article. I love the writing style of yours. Your idea of using social media for real estate is quite new and good. I really appreciate your post! Social Media can be automated to an extent to where Twitter, Facebook and the others can be of great benefit to you without all of the management.There are ways to make the simple. Most social media sites are absolutely free. Popular social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn expose your real estate investing business to the world even more. Thanks for such a great post!!… Read more »

Wow, it is so interesting post. Very useful information. I really like this post.
I will bookmark and share to everyone. Thanks for posting a great article. Your idea is outstanding.
I’m very glad that I stumbled throughout this in my search for something regarding this.
I have read and shared to all my friends. Thanks again.

Its phenomenon. Collaborating real estate with social media is really appealing. I gathered useful stuff from this article about real estate that I was really looking for. Thank you for the share.It is a good practice to let people know more about purchase and sale of property through social media.

Hii all,
First of all would like to say that great post buddy..!!!
Now a days, as everything has shifted on-line, real estate sales are also being affected by this. Even I have linked my business to various social platforms and have observed an increase in my sales.
Cheers buddy..!!!1

Social media is such a huge factor in sales today and as and investor, I also use it in promoting my business. I actually reached about 20% more in sales after distributing ads in facebook twiter and instagram alone.

Awesome Post Rebekah ! And it’s right that many real estate agencies are now using social media to helping people who are looking for advise on property to buy or sale.If you are a real estate agent or running a real estate agency and helping people to buy sale property, then surely they will contact you to buy or sale property.

While it has been four quite a while following my family and companions and that i moved into our home, I will without a doubt attach with what now intrigue home buyers. With 5 minimal ones I needed to understand that there happen to be places my adolescents could enliven them selves at, like an adjacent park or play area. High-evaluated instructive establishments, consolidated with the mitigate of obtaining shopping centers, have been likewise one more in addition to every time we have been making sense of on where you have the capacity to abide.

Magnificent article! I cherish the part about helping and I put stock in karma. I recall helping somebody with “something” as of late and I finished getting a decent lump of member deals … in addition, a lifetime long of tru

While it has been four a long time since my family and friends and that i moved into our home, I will undoubtedly hook up with what now interest home purchasers. With 5 little ones I required to realize that there happen to be places my youngsters could entertain them selves at, similar to a nearby park or playground. High-rated educational institutions, combined with the relieve of purchasing malls, have been also one more plus each time we have been figuring out on where you are able to dwell.

Awesome article! I love the part about helping and I believe in karma. I remember helping someone with ‘something’ recently and I ended getting a nice chunk of affiliate sales … plus, a lifetime long of trust.

Great post. I myself am not a real estate agent, but I still believe it would do your real estate business a great service to at the very least have some sort of social media presence… even if you work for a larger company. Set up your OWN twitter account, FB page, and start using it as a social tool to engage with clients and answer questions.